My actual pregnancy was pretty uneventful. I was very thankful for this since life in itself was VERY eventful at the time. You spent your first 5 months in my belly living in Sacramento, CA. We decided to move back to PA to be closer to our families and surprisingly everything worked out pretty smoothly with your Dad and I getting/keeping our jobs and moving. We were very sad to leave our CA “family” that we had been with over the past 5 years, but knew this was the right move for our growing family.
From the start, we knew that we were going to find out what you were because I can’t stand surprises and I’m way too impatient to wait 9 months to know what was kicking me for all those months! The week that we were leaving to move back we found out you were a boy! I was shocked (a good kind of shocked)…I expected a girl since it’s just me and your Aunt Jill and your Dad is the only boy out of 4 kids and when you look at both our families girls seem to be the thing! Your Aunt Kris broke the girl cycle with Kyle and Adam so I guess we’re just following suit.
What next? Moving. The Army Corp. moved us back to PA and this time we got to hop on a plane to move because of my “medical condition”. Apparently, the government thinks pregnancy is a condition! Whatever it was, we didn’t care, we were happy to hop on a plane and not be driving, which we had to do on the way out to CA. Once we got back and settled things were pretty calm.
I started measuring “big” around 32 weeks so they had me go for an extra ultrasound to check you out. Everything was fine and they said I was just going to have a BIG baby…like 10 pounds big (start anxiety about having 10 pound baby here). I was only 5lbs. 12oz. when I was born so I had nothing to do other than blame this BIG BABY on your Dad – and I reminded him of this often.
At 37 weeks in my belly, Me, your Grandma, Aunt Jill and Aunt Paula went to see the Rachel Ray show in NYC. I think they felt bad for the Shamu looking pregnant lady and thought I needed face time on TV to feel good about myself, so they put us in the front row of the audience. Rod Stewart was on that day and it was so cool (I realize by time your able to read this you will probably have no clue who Rod Stewart is)! When he and Rachael sat down to talk she said “That pregnant lady was so excited to see you I thought she was going to have the baby!” Then, Rod Stewart talked to me and was asking me about when I was due, etc. So, you were sort of famous at this point and you weren’t even born yet :) It was really cool and we each got a $500 gift card to Macy’s that day. Yes, I was so excited that I’m surprised I didn’t have you right there!
Moving on…with 3 weeks left to go until your due date of January 10, 2010…blizzards were in that winter, it felt like we had one every week – and you were set to arrive smack dab in the middle of winter. So, we just hoped there wouldn’t be any snow storms when it was time for you to arrive.
A week before your due date I went to the hospital thinking my water broke and they sent me home reassuring me that it didn’t and I’d know when it did. Ok, fine people, and back home we went. At my 40 week appointment Dr. Alam decided to schedule me to be induced on Wednesday, Jan. 13th at 6pm because of the fact that I was carrying a supposed 10 pound baby. How nice. Scheduled. This will be great (goes right along with me not liking surprises).
On the morning I was set to be induced, I woke up at 8:30am because it felt like you kicked me – how dare you kick me after I treated you so well for 9 months (chicken fingers, fries, ice cream, chips…not every kid is so lucky you know). Turns out you didn’t kick me – my water broke! From this point on things get blurry for me since major panic set in.
Your Dad was at work, so I called him and told him to come home. In the meantime, I paced around the house calling people to tell them we were going to the hospital. Dad had to hop a cab and he got home in record time. He told me on the way back home traffic was terrible because the opposite side of the road had a major accident (yep, it was morning rush hour and that’s the route we needed for the hospital and we didn’t have a Plan B route). He also told me he was on the phone with your Gram telling her I was in labor and when the cab driver heard him say that he threw a Bible (or his Bible equivalent) up on the dashboard and took off! Thank you Mr. Cab driver for speeding.
Off to the hospital we go, we were getting directions for Plan B while we drove and I had the What to Expect book open on my lap reading how to deliver a baby in the car. I wasn’t even having labor pains yet, but I’ve seen this happen in the movies and I was prepared. No baby in the car, we got to the hospital and I told your Dad to park in the lot and I’ll walk to the hospital with him. I step out of the car and whoosh…water! Dad gives me his coat to put around my waist and when we get in to the hospital the security guard clears the way for us and makes everyone wait to get on the elevator so we can go on alone. He hits the button for the basement instead of the 2nd floor and we end up going down before we go up, so the doors open at the first floor again and the same people we left in our dust are now staring at us. Yes, we feel very stupid at this point and the security guard now lets everyone on the elevator with us.
Now, we get checked in around 10am and the nurse comes in to see me. She takes my BP and tells me it’s super high! Well, no crap lady! They decide that they’re going to let me progress on my own, which I was happy about. At about 6pm, they decided to move me in to the labor and delivery room and were going to start Pitocin. They offered me the epidural at that point, but I told them I’d wait until I got moved because I was still able to get through the contractions at that point. Once we got moved it was determined I was doing fine on my own and I didn’t need the Pitocin.
At about 8pm, I started to feel the contractions A LOT! I asked for the epidural and they told me it was a full moon and the anesthesiologist had 2 emergency C-sections, so the back-up guy was on his way in to the hospital and I’d have to wait (they re-assured me that this rarely happens – thanks!). Well, I did just about everything other than throw myself from the bed to make the contractions feel better and your Grammy and Dad were both there with me and helped me through them (while I tried to keep my eye on the prize). Around 9:30pm, the heavens opened up and a man walked through the door. If he wasn’t the anesthesiologist I probably would’ve ripped his head off. It was him, the man of the hour, the man I’ve been waiting for all my life, he held the golden ticket. He wanted to talk to me about the epi and I told him to talk while he gave it to me. He did…then there was peace, but still not the kind of peace I had hoped for (I think he went light on my cocktail), but it was much much better. From day 1, I was pretty confident that I wanted meds and didn’t want to suffer through the pains.
Fast forward to 11:00pm and I told the nurse I was ready to push. They checked and I was, so off we went starting to push. Push, push and more pushing. Around 12:30 or so, I started a fever and they were afraid that it meant I/we had an infection. They monitored it, but said if I didn’t have you in the next hour we’d have to go for a C-section, but didn’t want to do a C-section because it’s actually worse to do one if there’s an infection. So, your trooper of a Dad and my nurse of the year kept me going. At around 1:10 the doctor (Dr. DeSouza-Sanders) came in and gave me a choice. It’s straight to a C-section or we can try the vacuum one time. I let her pick, my mind wasn’t exactly high functioning at the moment. She decided to try to the vacuum and it worked. Phew! 2.5 hours of pushing and 17 hours after my water broke – you were HERE! Our “10 pound baby”, aka Tyler David, arrived at The Pennsylvania Hospital on January 14th at 1:30am, weighing 7lbs. 6oz and 20 ¾ in. long. You were the most perfect little guy ever!
We got to cuddle a little bit, but then they had to take you to the NICU to treat for a possible infection. You spent all day Thursday and half the day Friday in the NICU. You looked like the bully down there with all those tiny little babies and we spent a lot of time with you there just rocking and holding you. We were very happy to hear that you didn’t have an infection after all that, our fevers were just caused by a stressful, hard labor. We were both just worn out. They let you come back to the room with us Friday afternoon and we went home Saturday on a beautiful, bright, sunny, 40 degree January day and you’ve been making us smile ever since ♥
And a year and a half later our baby is growing up...your learning how much fun the summer rain and puddles can be...
And having the time of your life with your friends across the street jumping in their bounce house
Where has the time gone!!
1 comment:
Ha! I loved reading Tyler's birth story- glad you documented it:) Thanks for keeping up with this- so thankful to "watch" Tyler grow and be a part of your lives even though we're so far away!
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